You’ve probably all heard that Indian Prime Minister Modi ordered two of the most common high denomination bills (500 and 1,000 rupee) out of circulation and that they would no longer be legal tender after only a few days. India’s economy is, well, not modern. Most people do not have or use credit cards. Only […]

I got this picture from Corrente in one of Lambert’s posts. It’s a picture of the inside of Obama’s campaign headquarters in Chicago. If you’ve ever wondered why so many of his fanboys sound like young guys who don’t have families or responsibilities, well, here’s your answer:

Do you see any women in that picture? There might be a few waaaaaay in the back but mostly it looks like the library of an oversized frat house. I like the Adidas shoes though. They remind me of the ones I had when I was a freshman at Pitt. Very comfy.

And voting for him would be what? And why is there an unspoken assumption that if you don’t want to vote for Obama that you’re naturally going to vote for Romney? Isn’t that a bit presumptuous? There are other candidates, you know.

By the way, how is insulting your voters supposed to work anyway? When we’re out here struggling to get by on our dwindling savings why are we confronted with another teachable moment about race? Is the Obama fanbase trying to suggest that if we weren’t racists we’d be more prosperous? Or are they trying to blame our stupidity for our unemployment problems? Are they trying to depress us and strip us of our self esteem and make us feel bad about our situation, because that doesn’t seem like a winning formula to me. If anyone in the fanbase wants to address the logic behind the messaging and blaming the victims, I’m all ears. Well, I’m all ears to a message that treats me as a college educated adult that can reason my way out of a paper bag. I like a message that doesn’t condescend to flimflam me about Obama’s “accomplishments” and tell me that Lilly Ledbetter solved all my problems. I’m not Cindy Lou Who. If the message is going to give me a plan and concrete examples of how Obama is going to turn this ship around in the next four years that sound convincing, I could be open to that. But I haven’t seen it yet and none of it passes my smell test.

Charles Pierce did a post on Obama’s headquarters last week. Besides the fact that the place is locked down like a fortress and you can’t get in without surrendering your driver’s license, the place is locked down like a fortress. These guys are on social media sites all day shaping the message. This a the reason why I’ve avoided facebook and why I don’t hang out at many lefty blogs.

But who the heck are they talking to? I don’t relate to these people and I doubt that they relate to me. To me, they’re just the online manifestation of hooliganism. They’re loud, aggressive and intimidating in the comment threads. It’s not that I don’t think I can handle it. I just ask myself why I should bother. They’re not hired to have an argument with you. They’re there to incite a bait ball frenzy with their partners, shut you up and drive you away. They’re not in the persuasion business. They’re in the enforcement business, not unlike the riot cops who the DHS sics on Occupy protestors every time they get together. It’s almost like they’re trying to prevent us from getting together and comparing notes about Obama’s performance. We can’t have that. We might discover that racism and stupidity have nothing to do with it.

We’re coming up on the 4th anniversary of that infamous RBC hearing in Washington where the rules were rewritten to make sure they were more equal for Obama at the expense of all of the other voters in America who 1.) didn’t think he was ready to be president and 2.) couldn’t identify with his asshole fanbase. And the problem with Obama still hasn’t changed. He’s still not ready to be president and he still has a bunch of assholes working for him. And these assholes, who appear to have all of the experience of 22-28 year old unmarried men, have the nerve to dictate to the rest of us that if we don’t vote for him again, we’re stupid racists and if he loses, all of the catastrophes that follow will be our fault.

How about we look at it this way? It’s not the responsibility of the voters to ensure that the fanboys’ employer gets reelected. It is the candidate’s responsibility to do a good job and make sure he is leading the country in a positive direction with a vision of the future that the rest of us can relate to. That’s the way it works. It is and always will be the Economy, stupid.

The candidate lucked out when the market tanked in 2008 because from what I could see, the campaign wasn’t over and his presidency was not assured back then. Now, we know what he is and he’s going to have to do a better job before voters give him four more years. And these guys in their shrinkwrapped, airconditioned bunkers, sealed for their own protection and away from the real world are not helping his image.

One more thing: This is for all of the blogger/pundit types out there who write witty and incisive prose about the failures of the Obama administration (you know who you are). We read your stuff and know that you’re just as horrified as we are that Obama has given everything away to Wall Street. We know that you can predict how badly life is going to suck for those of us who will be on the losing end of the Grand Bargain. We know that you’re appalled by Obama’s poor performance. It’s not hard to read between the lines. So, do us all a favor and stop running around with your hair on fire about how we must vote for him or Armageddon will come when Romney is elected. That assumes that nothing can be done and all hope is lost. That isn’t helping. You haven’t even tried yet.

If I had your megaphone, I would use it.

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This video of the saucepan demonstrations in Quebec is going viral so let’s spread it around too:

See the difference? Those are average people. They’re not all from Sigma Pi.

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Body: Last week I went down to Washington, D.C. to deliver a paper at a conference in the technical field where I worked, ten years or so and two or three careers ago, before the dot.com trash. The trip was solely an exercise in merit-making, since I doubt very much I'll get work in the field, but reconnecting with old friends was really great -- even […]

"Barrett Brown has been released from prison; WikiLeaks publishes to celebrate: Today, investigative journalist Barrett Brown has been released from FCI Three Rivers to a halfway house outside Dallas, earlier than initially scheduled. His parents picked him up from the federal prison to drive him six hours to his new residence. Brown's release come […]